GOP Continues to Embrace Neo-Confederates

Joe Wilson's Dixie partisans

The stupid behavior of entertainer Kanye West and
politician Joe Wilson demonstrated, if any fresh proof is necessary, that
thoughtless rudeness isn't confined by ethnicity, ideology or background. With
their highly public episodes of misconduct, both earned sharp public censure.

Yet while West has expressed real remorse for his
misbehavior at the MTV Video Music Awards, Wilson
has swiftly left behind a quick apology to cash in on his historic insult to
the president of the United
States.

The South
Carolina conservative's political consultants have
raised upward of a million dollars from donors across the country who want to
express solidarity with him for blurting "You lie!" on the House
floorâ€”and they're peddling T-shirts emblazoned with "I'm With Joe
Wilson." Those same consultants are now promoting his noxious outburst as
an act of patriotism.

Nothing surprising there, however, to anyone
familiar with the Wilson
entourage and outlook. The consultant behind the excitable right-wing
congressman is Richard Quinn, long a central figure in both South Carolina
Republican politics and the "neo-Confederate" movement, notably as
editor and publisher of a periodical called The
Southern Partisan.

As a staunch defender of the antebellum way of life,
he has advocated displaying Confederate symbols on public property and opposed
the Martin Luther King holiday, and sought to restore the reputation of slave
owners.

Long before Quinn started selling those Joe Wilson
tees, his magazine used to market T-shirts denigrating Abraham Lincoln, which
displayed a portrait of him above the slogan "Sic Semper
Tyrannis"â€”the phrase shouted by John Wilkes Booth after shooting the Civil
War president. No doubt Quinn considered that to be an expression of
"patriotism," too, although not to the United States of America.

It is not accidental that Wilson is a client of the Quinn firm (which
has also represented Arizona Sen. John McCain, much to his shame). The South Carolina
congressman is a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, once a relatively
harmless organization of nostalgic Southerners that has been transformed into a
virulently racist outfit in recent years.

Before his election to Congress, Wilson was among
the tiny minority of state legislators in South Carolina who fought to the
bitter end for the right to fly a Confederate flag over the statehouseâ€”a
campaign in which those die-hards enjoyed the support of Quinn's fund-raising
and publicity apparatus.

Republicansâ€™ Ugly Underside

This is the ugly underside of the furthest
right-wing elements of the Republican Party. Promoting Joe Wilson as a symbol
of the GOP is a dangerous game, but it is nothing new for a political
leadership that has been flirting with the neo-Confederates for decades now.
Ever since Strom Thurmond left the Democratic Party in 1948, what was once the
party of Lincoln
has veered closer and closer to the ideology of his assassins.

Even now, Republican leaders in Washingtonâ€”presumably including the black
chairman of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steeleâ€”make common cause
with the neo-Confederates. They pretend not to notice the Dixie
flags, the habitual expressions of racism and bigotry or the poisonous attitude
toward Lincoln, King and other heroes of the nation. And they pretend that the
politicians who stoke these smoldering hatreds are loyal to the same ideals as
the rest of us.

Such weird political configurations also appeared
briefly during the candidacy of Sarah Palin, whose career in Alaska was promoted by the secessionist
party there. That strange interludeâ€”which also embarrassed McCainâ€”is similarly
an artifact of the Republican attraction to the extreme right.

Whether this extremism will help the party regain a
majority next year, or hinder its prospects, isn't yet clear. The House
Republicans are staking their reputation on support for Wilson against a censure resolution.
Fortunately for the people of South Carolina,
he will have to face Democrat Rob Miller, a Marine veteran of the Iraq war whose
service to country and political maturity are not in question.

Early polls after the Wilson disgrace suggested that the outcome of
that contest is anything but assured for the incumbent.

I don't see the corrleation to the Confederate flag and racism. Many southern states still fly the flag. Its just part of their proud heritage. Kentucky Fried Chicken, Winn Dixie supermarkets, and Krispy Kreme donuts - all symbols I associate with the south. The flag is just part of the culture. We got bigger fish to fry than some stupid flag. Lets not be so petty.

Poll

A Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission panel upheld the firing of former Milwaukee Police officer Christopher Manney for violating department rules last April when he encountered Dontre Hamilton before fatally shooting him. Do you agree with the commission’s decision?